Polaroids From Space

For this last Space Balloon project i have made a seperate website. The result of the project was 3150 digital images, 8 Polaroids, 3 hours of video and 45 hours of data.

This project was about making some polaroids in space. I attached a polaroid camera and some gizmo’s to a high altitude balloon, launched towards space. I launched it in the Netherlands, and after a flight taking a few hours, it landed in Germany. Although i traced the payload by radiotransmission, it went so far into Germany that i stopped the persuit. Eventually someone found it, and i got it back.

My Design

Why

why not?
Although I have to admit, that I am unsure which of these are more valuable;
– 3.150 digital images from the Canon Powershots on board…or
– 8 unique unreproducable Polaroids, first to be developed in space
Maybe the latter, but still, even these will have ended up somewhere in my desk drawer.

How

Put film in the Polaroid camera, and attach the Polaroid camera to a balloon.
We put some hot-wire under the camera to keep the film and camera warm when inside the camera.
Two Canon Powershots were included, and a GoPro to film it all. We had a seperate GPS tracker, and a flightcomputer with GPS
that reported its position through a Radiotransmission that was heared and decoded by radio operators from the UK, Holland, Belgium, Denmark and Czechia.

We were chasing the payload in our car from Holland while decoding its radiotransmission. Then the payload started floating on our atmosphere at 35km. We decided to drive back.

Later the balloon burst and the payload landed in eastern Germany. We knew where it landed, and after some calls our payload returned safely.